Mustafi hails Arsenal players for recent form after “disappointing” few months

Author:
Barnaby Lane
March 29, 2018

Arsenal defender Shkodran Mustafi has praised his team-mates for their recent good form after what he described as a “difficult” few months in North London.

Arsene Wenger’s men have endured an awful start to the new year, winning only three games – a run of form that saw them slip to sixth in the Premier League and an huge 33 points behind leaders Manchester City.

City also inflicted the Gunners with back-to-back 3-0 defeats in February, one of those being in the Carabao Cup final at Wembley to seemingly end any chance of silverware for Arsene Wenger’s side.

However after a surprise upturn in form and brilliant victories over AC Milan in the Europa League to take the club into the quarter-finals, a chance for a trophy is back on – an opportunity Mustafi plans to take full advantage of after a dismal start to the year.

“To be honest, this season has been more disappointing for us because we had bigger targets,” he told Arsenal Player. “One really big positive thing is that to be able to recover from such a period when everything goes bad and you’re not in form, to be close together and come out of it as a team is a really big, massive thing.

Danny Welbeck scores against AC Milan.

“I’ve been playing in a lot of teams across Europe and I’ve been playing in teams where we have been doing well, I’ve been playing in teams where we’ve been struggling, and it’s not easy to come out especially when you’re a big team.

“You find yourself fighting in every game against every opponent. I think you have to give credit to the team because we managed to come together and go back to the basics. Everyone was fighting for each other to try to get back on a winning streak.

“Everyone knew it was a difficult period. The meeting was about trying to listen to different opinions, different ideas and different feelings, and I think we found a way to try to change a bit.

“It’s not that easy because one meeting is not going to change a lot, especially not during the season when you’re playing every three days, but it was important to speak our opinions out loud. Overall it was about giving 110 per cent to try to get out of it, and I think we managed it well.”